Today's writing

Not everyone watches the Food Network while waiting to undergo weight-loss surgery. Then again, not everyone is as hooked on food as I am. 

“We should make that,” I tell my husband, pointing to the screen. A woman in a low-cut top stirs risotto and murmurs assessments that sound more than vaguely sexual.

Adam raises his eyebrows. “We should probably make stuff you're going to be able to eat,” he says.

Oh. Yeah.

I'm at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, which overlooks Oakland in all its gritty glory. It's a rooftops run riot, gray snakes of roads, wisps of greenery. I'm playing I-Spy: a Starbucks, a car-detailing shop, the Samuel Merritt nursing school. Above it all is a semicircle of dark hills, an overseer of sorts. Looking at them feels somehow like staring at the sun, risky, potential retina damage.

I'm slated for Lap-Band surgery. Picture a belt cinched around your stomach, creating a pouch. That limits your food intake. That means you lose weight. That's the theory, anyway.

The Lap-Band means changes. I'm not sure I'm ready for them, but they're coming nonetheless.

“Ah,” the woman on the screen says, sucking her finger. “So good.”

I roll my eyes. “Is she fucking or making food?”

“Sometimes,” Adam says, his gaze not shifting from the screen, “there is no difference.”

It's moments like these that tell me I'm doing the right thing: It's only eye candy, he likes to tell me, but eye candy still fills some sort of hunger. “You like her.”

His eyes lock onto mine. “Actually,” he says, “she's kind of ridiculous.”

Ridiculous, sure, but a size six while she's at it. She's making that risotto, but does she actually eat any of it? Does she survive on an apple and a slice of beef jerky per day? Does she celebrate her cheekbones, applaud her flat abs? Mmm, so good.